Tablet Shoppers Changing the Face of Ecommerce

The holiday shopping season is almost here! Monetate recently released an infographic (which you can view here), which shows the changing landscape of online shopping due to tablet shoppers. Take a look at this snippet below:

Tablet Surfing Explosion for Online Stores

From 2011 to 2012, ecommerce traffic from tablets increased by 348% while PC traffic fell for ecommerce from 94% to 88% from 2011 to 2012. By 2015, the number of iPad users in the US is expected to reach over 90.8 million users. And one more surprising note, the fastest growing demographic for tablet users is the 65+ age group with 134% grown in 2012.

Why Does this Matter?

More tablet users means that it’s becoming increasingly important to show up in mobile search as well as be tablet-friendly. As we are already in the boom age of tablet use, you want to really make sure that your business and website is prepared for 2014. Otherwise, be prepared to leave your users in the dust as they’ll be deterred by slow load time and navigation that’s tablet unfriendly. Even if you think your website is perfect the way it is, it really isn’t if you don’t have a tablet or responsive version.

Tips for Tablet Optimization

Some tips for tablet optimization include adding larger buttons for navigation, pages that are swipe-friendly and of course, responsive design. Remember to think in terms of fingers and taps instead of clicks and typing. This also means incorporating features like auto save for forms. Matt Cutts recently talked about this at Pubcon 2013, and it’s something that hopefully most websites will soon implement. Another viable option is engaging in real-life user testing, there are many different companies that specialize in this. Basically, you pay a user to test and review your website. You can create a prompt and very thorough directions and questions for a web user tester who will then give you specific feedback. This is helpful to get insight from a real-life potential customer who doesn’t have the bias of knowing everything about your industry. 2014 will definitely be the year for tablet surfers, don’t forget it!